I've been mulling over the idea of another custom instrument. I'm after a happy medium between the thunderous lows which my Rogue 5 has thanks to its ebony neck laminate and the shredding mids/highs that tend to dominate the tone of my Essence and JPJ Custom.

Physics would lead me to believe doing an ebony lam that isn't as thick would do this? After all it is the presence and overall mass of that wood that is giving the big booty (lower fundamental harmonic). So less of it would make me think a little less bootyfied.

For as different as JPJ and Essence are in wood and electronics they sound remarkably similar when everything is turned up full. Both have a very extremely aggressive sound. The Rogue has a very noticible boost in the low end department thanks to that ebony neck laminate but has less overall "bite" for a lack of a better word.

I'm pondering getting another 5 string done and converting the Rogue to a fretless. But I really don't want to drop all the dough on another if I'm not going to get the desired effect. Hence the above question.

There should be a significant difference between your Essence and your JPJ. If there is not, then it may have more to do with your rig and how it's EQ'd.

Your Essence is all Maple and should have lots of attack and tons of high end.

Your JPJ has a Mahogany body instead of Maple and a Walnut top instead of Maple, plus Purpleheart lams in the neck and body. This bass should have much less attack and high end prominence than the Essence. It should be warmer with a lot more low end support.

The Maple top on the Rogue should help to make up for the loss of a Maple neck lam as compared to the JPJ. And the Ebony lam will of course give more low end support.

But again, if your not noticing much of a difference between the JPJ and the Essence, then I would suggest playing with how your rig is EQ'd, just to see if you can bring out the differences in the two basses.

But yes, I would agree that a thinner Ebony lam in the neck, which would be replaced by more Maple, should help get to where you want to be. Another route might be to leave the Ebony lam as is and replace the Purpleheart neck lams with Maple. And of course Maple front and back body lams. Replacing the Mahogany body is another consideration. Perhaps a Walnut body with Maple top and back, or a Maple body with Walnut top and back.